Becoming More Efficient #1 - Avoiding the Lack of Sleep

lefactuoscope (61)in #motivation • 8 years ago

If you take public transport in the morning on business days, you see many other people who are going to work.

Very often, among these people, many look exhausted, certainly because they didn't slept enough during the night. Whether you take the bus, the tram or the subway, you see people in this case early during the morning.

So, why don't they sleep enough? Perhaps because they have insomnia. Or perhaps because they went to bed too late. They went too late, they had a rough awakening, and there are not in a good mood... until they reach the coffee machine...

The negative effects of the lack of sleep on your health and your efficency

If you are a "night owl", you certainly experienced the negative effects of the lack of sleep when you have to get up very early, and there rather concerning...

Fatigue, lack of energy.
Headaches.
Less concentration, decreased awareness.
Less efficient learning.
Increasing consumption of sugar-rich food.
Decreased immunity.
Increased risk of depression.

Maybe you often noticed that when you had a little sleep, you are not only exhausted, but you also have less concentration. How many times have you done stupid or basic mistakes just because you didn't sleep enough? How many times have you felt depressed after a short night ? How many times have you tried to compensate by eating sugar-rich food? How many times have you almost made a terrible mistake just because you were lacking of concentration and awareness? Ask yourself these questions...

When you have the habit of not sleeping enough, you are not only tired, but you also become less efficient in your studies, in your work or even during your free time activities! Moreover, you're damaging your health!

Get up early

An obvious thing to avoid the lack of sleep is simply going to bed earlier. If you have to wake up at 6 a.m., you will feel better if you sleep from 11 p.m. rather than from 00.30 a.m.

Avoid eating too late

Generally, if you eat late in the evening, that's either because you didn't take the time too cook earlier, or because were too busy. If you start cooking later, you will eat later, you will go to bed later, and you will have less rest.

Avoid using screens just before going to bed

Since the democratization of the Internet and then the democratization of smartphones, we spend more time in front of LCD screens. All of us have lost many and many sleep hours on Facebook, YouTube or video games. These distractions make us more reluctant to go to bed, and then we sleep less. We sleep less and more badly. Why? Because using screens before sleeping is not a very good idea. Maybe some of you are wondering why it would be worst than reading a book or preparing the lunch for the next day. The answer is simple: because of blue-light emission. Yes, that's what you just read.

Blue light has some negative effects on your sleep. Many scientific studies showed that the exposure to blue-light delay your circadian cycles and the secretion of melatonin. Melatonin is sleep-promoting hormone produced by your brain. If your brain produce less melatonin, you will feel the need to sleep later, and you will have more difficulty to fall asleep. If you have to get up early, you will feel tired because you didn't sleep enough. If you don't sleep enough, you will be less concentrated and less efficient at work.

So, avoid being exposed to screens and blue light just before going to bed. You don't need to totally avoid screens, but you have to avoid them too much at the wrong time. Here are some pieces of advice...

Don't use your smartphone or your tablet in bed.
During the night, use special settings to diminish the intensity of blue light on your smartphone. You can find dedicated applications on the App Store and Google Play.
Avoid using your PC just before going to bed.
Rather than spending too much time on social networks, try to read a book.
If you need to use your PC during the night, you can use blue-light blocking glasses, like the ones made by Gunnar. Otherwise, I recommand f.lux: this software reduces the amount of blue light on your screen during the night.

Get up early

If you are reluctant to get to bed early, if you have difficulty to fall asleep before midnight or 1 p.m., here is a simple solution: start by getting up earlier. It will put you back on tracks, and it will help you with getting more organized.

If you get up earlier, you have fewer risks to be late for work, and you have more time for doing something else before leaving. For instance, you can go to the backery or go jogging.

Credits: Pixabay.

If you're looking for an apartment or a new job, you can send some e-mails during the working while savoring your coffee. You won't have to wait the lunch break to do it. If you send your e-mails earlier, they have more chances to be read earlier in the morning.

What are the other advantages of getting up early? For example, saving money. If you can take some time to cook your lunch for the lunch break, you won't have to go to a sandwich shop or whatever fast food restaurant. It will allow you to save some money each week.

Be careful during the weekends

Taking good habits during the business week is a thing. Keeping them during the weekend is another one. During the weekend, you watch movies or TV series, you play online video games , you waste too much time on social networks or you go partying. Then, you get up at 11 or 12 a.m. on Saturdays and Sundays. Then, you can't sleep early in Sunday night... and you feel tired and in a bad mood on Monday evening...

So, what can you do? Well, improve your rhythm of life, even during the weekend. I'm not telling you not to get up at 2 or 3 a.m. on Saturdays. I'm just telling you to avoid getting up too late in the morning during the weekend and the days before a working day. If you get up late on Sunday morning, it will be more difficulty to fall asleep early on Sunday night. So, even during the weekends, you can use an alarm clock. Schedule roughly 7 to 8 hours of sleep. Thus, you will sleep enough but not too much, and you won't suffer social jet lag.

If you don't want to get up in the morning during your weekends, maybe it's because you have nothing scheduled outside. However, you can schedule things. You can do some sport, you can go to the market or the supermarket, you can post all the letters you had to post during the week or you can do the housework you should have done three days ago...

Even if you don't go on weekend, even if you don't have professional or family obligations, you can organize your weekend.

Apply what you just read

I wrote this post on Sunday afternoon and maybe you're reading it on this same day, or even the next Saturday. Nevermind, nothing stop you from applying the pieces of advices in this post in order to start the following week...

If you manage your time, you will feel more in shape.